Re: Firware drivers?
On Tue, 08 Feb 2011 09:09:20 -0800, Mark wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 8, 2011 at 7:36 AM, Camaleón wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 08 Feb 2011 14:51:00 +0100, Geronimo wrote:
>>
>> (...)
>>
>> > Now its time, to become more pragmatic, which means, debian should
>> > offer installation media, that include non-free firmware ... That
>> > installation media should be marked as non-free, but I think, it is
>> > vital to have it.
>>
>> I'm afraid you'll have to fight with Debian's own Policies:
>>
>> http://www.debian.org/CD/faq/index.en.html#nonfree
>>
>>
> I for one am fine with the Debian policies and am thankful to have such
> a great free OS. My struggle, and I doubt it is mine alone, is that as
> a first-time upgrader, the Lenny to Squeeze transition might break a few
> systems, which I have a limited window of time to fix if something goes
> wrong.
And let me add that "any" system upgrade is capable of breaking thinks.
For those who want/need a smooth upgrade I would recommend to install the
new release in parallel with the old release, that is, leaving lenny at
the same state and perform a new install of Squeeze in a different
partition. So if something wrong happens, you can always boot the old
version and work with that. Is time consuming and requires double disk
space but for many environments thats should not be a problem at all.
> I need to be prepared as much as possible given those
> circumstances, hence I've been scouring the Release Notes. The biggest
> concern for me is how, for example ipw2x00 and bcm43xx firmware upgrades
> will work.
You should read Release Notes, yes, and prepare for the worst. For
example, if you are thinking of doing a remote upgrade, I would avoid
that in this case. Unless you (not "you" but any user) have the proper
expertise to deal with these problems remotely, there is a higher chance
that you'll get hosed.
> According the the Release Notes, it seems that the
> firmware-linux package may handle it (
> http://www.debian.org/releases/squeeze/i386/release-notes/ch-whats-
new.en.html#nonfree-firmware)
Note that this section if not specifically for "upgrades" for for "what's
new", in general. Yes, firmwares will be available the problem here is
how the upgrade system will handle them, so you should keep an eye on
what is the "proposal" of the upgrade routine.
Of course, if you see that those firmware packages are marked to be
"removed" you should stop the upgrade operation and report it.
> but the Debian wiki says to use the /etc/apt/sources.list method (
> http://wiki.debian.org/ipw2200#InstallationonEstablishedSystems for
> ipw2x00 and http://wiki.debian.org/bcm43xx#b43-b43legacy for b43xx).
> When I try to see what the firmware-linux metapackage contains, the
> debian webpage returns an error (??)
> (http://packages.debian.org/squeeze/firmware-linux).
At this point you should stop the upgrading procedure and report.
> So given that info, on systems that already have "contrib non-free" in
> /etc/apt/sources.list with the appropriate firmware installed and
> working, will the "firmware-linux" metapackage load the necessary
> firmware when following the procedures in the Release Notes? Or will
> the methods in the Debian Wiki be necessary after upgrading?
Also note that the metapackage is like a "bundle" for all the firmwares
and you may not need all of them. I hope there is still available each
firmware to download independently :-?
Anyway, I think that none of the currently installed firmwares should be
removed or marked to be removed when upgrading. That's is something,
that, in the event it happens, I would report to the BTS.
> I apologize if this seems retarded to ask, but not everyone on this list
> is a Debian Master just yet.
No of course. And I would avoid upgrading as much as possible, I prefer a
clean and parallel install :-)
> I am making backups of all systems with Clonezilla before upgrading, in
> case anything catastrophic happens.
And that's a very good advice. Also, having a virtual machine with lenny
to "hit first there", is another good approach (of course not all the
problems will be present in a VM but it can help to deal with some of
them).
Greetings,
--
Camaleón
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